


I Hate To Wake You Up To Say Goodbye

by Zoya1416



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: F/M, Homesickness, Loss, Love, Therapy, the black gang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-06
Updated: 2014-05-06
Packaged: 2018-01-23 18:25:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1575173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zoya1416/pseuds/Zoya1416
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kareen Koudleka leaves Mark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Hate To Wake You Up To Say Goodbye

**Author's Note:**

> All Vorkosigan is LMB's.
> 
> "All my bags are packed  
> I'm ready to go  
> I'm standin' here outside your door  
> I hate to wake you up to say goodbye" 
> 
> "Leaving on a Jet Plane," written by John Denver, sung by Peter, Paul and Mary
> 
>  
> 
> I apologize for Mark's language, but nothing else would do.

Mark grimly surveyed the suitcases and boxes standing next to the apartment door.

“Can't you take a vacation home and then come back to me on Beta? I really need you.”

His voice trembled and the pitch got higher as he spoke.

Kareen shook her head, not looking at him.“You know I love you. I just can't stay on Beta. Why don't you come to Barrayar with me?

“I can't. All my business connections are here. You know my therapy is here—I'm making good progress but I'm not done yet.”

He thought to himself, 'and on Barrayar I'm a freak and it makes me want to kill somebody when they stare.'

His height was below five feet, his neck was short, and his back slightly crooked, all the results of the tormenting surgeries Galen had put him through. To Barrayaran eyes these flaws, to say nothing of his round obesity, would make him repulsive to them, a mutant in their eyes. He knew intellectually that on Beta these were easy problems to fix—these people could mold you into anything. But he was deathly allergic to surgeries. No more meddling with his body, at all.

Kareen had closed her eyes now, and was shaking her head.

“I miss home so much; being able to go outside in the wind, walk on grass, feel rain, snow—the trees. I didn't think it would matter so much—it didn't, the first year I was here with you, studying. We were together and that was all that mattered to me.”

His body was tightening, tingling—fear, anger? His therapist Dr. Tana always told him that recognizing his emotions was the first step in controlling and changing them. He couldn't believe Kareen would actually leave, actually abandon him, even though she'd been talking about it for weeks—his heart was pounding faster, and he didn't even know he was starting to yell.

“Doesn't that matter to you, now?—Kareen, I need you to do people for me! You know I'm no good with talking to people! When I try to tell someone about a new venture, they go hide on the other side of the room. You have them eating out of your hand in minutes!”

She turned away, then back to face him, as her therapist L'Dell had taught her: 'First, try to maintain eye contact. It helps to center you, and him. You can read his emotions even if he can't. Then stay calm and talk quietly.'

L'Dell's therapy wasn't helping at all—she was getting angrier too, and now she was shouting.

“I tried to go outside the other day, to walk in the desert. You know, just to see a horizon, something natural. Anything! I had my mask, the breather, even the cooler since it's summer. But the outer airlocks were closed from a sandstorm. I sat down at the observation ports—the winds were eighty or ninety kilometers an hour, all that sandy brown color whipping by. I couldn't see the sky, or the sun. And you can feel the dust, too, it gets in under the door seals.”

Momentarily diverted he exclaimed, “it shouldn't do that! That port's defective. Did you tell maintenance?”

“I did, when I was coming back. She shook her head and said that even though the airlock is sucked clean every time it's used, they can't get it all. It sifts very finely all around the ducts and doors. You can feel it with your fingers.”

She lifted her head to him, and he saw she had trails of tears on her cheeks.

“I love you so much. But being inside all the time, not seeing my family—even though I used to fight with Delia and Olivia and Martya, I miss them so very much. Ma and Da, Tante Cordelia, all my friends.”

“You can message them more”—now he was trying to placate, and stop the sick geyser of terror inside.

“Don't even try that!” Now she was crying harder, still yelling. 

“Sure, message them, and it takes days to get there! I can't talk on the comconsole and then go meet for coffee, see a show, whatever. And I know you give me everything, you have given me so much, so much—but I. Can't. Stay.” 

His breath was coming quicker now, his mind narrowing down. He had to make her stay, had to. Grunt and Howl wanted to activate, but had no clear goals. The skittering emotions on top of them which made him want to pull her back—that wasn't Killer, or Gorge. It was Mark. 

He did reach out, but not in a lover's touch. He grabbed her bare shoulder.  
“NO—don't do that!” She twisted and shoved at him, catching him off balance. He slipped on the slick flooring, falling.

He started to grab her again, yank her down with him, and then his hard-won reflexes cut in. He let go, crumpled into a ball, and wrapped his arms around his head, rocking. It was humiliating that he couldn't get control in any other way than going completely fetal, but Tana had said over and over—'if you think you might hurt her, and you can't leave, drop and hold. Stay down until your heart and breathing are normal.'

“I'm so sorry. So sorry. I don't deserve you. You've meant to much to me.”

He realized he'd used the past tense. Acceptance was raising a tiny wan leaf. 

'Everything changes, Mark.' Tana's mantra. 'Nothing lasts forever. Accept the day, the good things, when they happen. Wait and stay calm when bad things happen. If you can quiet your mind, do it. I don't suggest that you let the black gang do it for you. It's easy to give in to Gorge, especially. Try the visualiza--'

Fuck that, he thought. Fucking visualizations, fucking emotions. Fuck fucking weepy earth heritage music on the vid Kareen had found. “If I never loved, I never would have cried. I am a rock, I am an island. A rock feels no pain. And an island never cries.”

“No, you're not. You're not an island.” He hadn't realized he'd groaned out loud. She went on, “If you want to be alone, you can. But you have your Grandmother Naismith here, cousins, their friends. You can meet other women—I know you can. You've changed and grown, and don't think I don't know it. I so admire you.”

Every bit of his self control was needed for him to stagger first to his knees, then to his feet. Still turned away from her, he said, “When do you need to go? I'll help you take these to the bubble cars.”

“Thanks. I've got a little bit yet.”

He wasn't going to beg her for sex. But he still wanted to feel her warm curves again. 

“Let's sit on the couch. Can we? I won't grab, I just want to be next to you.”

“Okay.”

It was the hardest thing he'd ever done, not excluding killing Galen, for him to sit still and put his arm around her. Then she did lift her head up, kissed him, and gently pulled him down for one last time.  
\--------------  
After the shuttle snarled away, he sat still for a bit. Every nerve, every one of the black gang was calling him. Eat, fight, fuck, carve up his own body, or someone else's—which should he do first?

It was the second hardest thing, not excluding killing Galen, for him to place the call:

“Dr. Tana? I need an emergency appointment. Kareen just left me.”

**Author's Note:**

> Credit to Simon and Garfunkel for "I am a Rock," part of the collection of their wonderfully depressive songs which exactly coincided with my angsty youth.


End file.
